Quand peut-on mettre un adjectif avant ou après un nom ? — When do adjectives go before or after a noun?

Question

Quelles sont les règles quant au placement des adjectifs avant ou après les noms ?Exemples : - *Un **bel** animal* (avec en prime le changement *beau* → *bel*… règle ?) - *Une **belle** maison* - *Une **verte** prairie* — *une prairie **verte*** (différence ?) - *Une maison **bleue*** - *Ma **petite** sœur* - *L'allée **principale***---What are the rules concerning the position of adjectives?

Answer 1

BANGS (beauty/age/numbers/ good and bad/ size) adjectives go before the French noun. As far as bel/ nouvel/vieil, your noun has to be masculine/ singular/ start with a vowel and an silent H in order for you to use these:

example: un bel ordinateur

Answer 2

Bonjour!

The rule about adjectives is that they follow the nouns, like la maison bleue, or le chien méchant (the bad dog). There are a set of adjectives that go before the noun - they represent ideas like beauty, age, goodness and size (BAGS)

beau (beautiful), joli (pretty),jeune (young), vieux (old), nouveau (new), bon (good), meilleur (better), mauvais (bad), gentil (kind), petit (small), haut (high), gros (fat)

there might be one or two more adjectives that fit into the BAGS category - just remember, keep your BAGS in front!